Betrayal
by Expelli-Effie
Summary: Rachel bombed her NYADA audition, Kurt did amazing. So why was it Rachel who got accepted instead?


"You are a star Rachel Barbara Berry." she told herself into the mirror. "You will get into NYADA."

Rachel dabbed a tissue at her cheeks, making sure her make-up wasn't completely ruined, she was still out in public after all, and Rachel Berry always, _always_, looks her best.

The door to the girl's bathroom was gently pushed open. Rachel raised her eyes to meet Kurt's in the mirror. He was leaning against the door, a look of concern in his eye, gently chewing on his lip.

"Your audition was great." Rachel said quietly. "You were right, 'Not the Boy Next Door' was perfect."

"Your audition was—" Kurt started.

"Don't. Don't say anything. I choked. This is the biggest audition of my life and I blew it." Rachel gasped. She felt a new lump forming in her throat, and her eyes stinging. A sob forced its way out before she could suppress it.

Kurt was by her side in two strides. He wrapped her up in his arms, resting his chin on Rachel's head. Rachel couldn't breathe, her sobs coming out faster than she could take in breath. The worst part was Kurt wasn't even yelling about snot and tears on his designer shirt. Rachel pushed him away and wiped her eyes with some toilet paper. "I don't need your pity Kurt."

"I don't pity you." He tried to assure her.

Rachel looked furious, "don't you dare lie to my face. Of course you pity me. You're getting into NYADA. You're not going to end up a Lima loser forever like I am."

Now it was Kurt's turn to look furious. "Rachel Berry, you shut up and listen to me. You are getting out of Ohio. You will go to New York, and you will be a star. I don't pity you, and you need to stop pitying yourself. So you blew the audition. But everyone who knows you can see you're something special. You will be going to New York."

With that Kurt stormed out of the bathroom.

Kurt briskly walked down the deserted hallways. He could not believe Rachel. Even if she blew her audition, and didn't make it into NYADA she still had better hope for her future than Kurt ever would. She was born to play roles once played by the likes of Liza Minnelli, Judy Garland, and of course Barbara Streisand. Kurt would be lucky to _ever_ get a lead role on Broadway. Sometimes being unique was a curse, more than a blessing.

"Hey. Hey Kurt." Someone grabbed his arm and spun him around. "Is she okay?"

"What do you think Blaine." Kurt snapped. "She's being over dramatic about everything. 'I'm Rachel, my life is over' boohoo."

"I don't understand why you're so upset." Blaine said calmly. "You nailed you're audition."

Kurt rolled his eyes and huffed. "Of course you don't understand. You can actually pass for straight. Even if I get into NYADA there is still no guarantee that I will get a lead on Broadway _ever_."

"If you get into NYADA? There is no if here Kurt. You are getting into NYADA. And if there aren't roles out there for you, we will just have to make some."

"We?" Kurt asked hopefully. "Mr. Anderson, I had no idea you were a writer."

Blaine looped his arm through Kurt's and they started off towards the school exit. "There are a lot of things you don't know about me."

"Rachel?" Leroy knocked on his daughter's door again. He hadn't seen her since she came home from her audition and locked herself away. "How did the audition go?"

Leroy stopped pressing his ear to the door when a knock from his front door sounded. "Hiram who's at the door?"

Leroy heard clunking feet coming up the stairs. "It's me Mr. Berry." Leroy looked to see Finn Hudson looking a little distressed.

"She's locked herself in her room. Didn't even look at us. What happened at the audition?" Hiram asked from behind Finn.

"She choked. It was horrible, and the judge lady wouldn't let her start over."

"What!" Both the of her dad's exclaimed.

"I don't really know. I'm just going to go talk to her if that's okay." Finn said. Both Leroy and Hiram nodded and walked to go wait in the living room for their star to come talk to them. They had to accept they couldn't fix this one.

Finn opened Rachel's door and looked for her. He finally figured the sniffling lump of blankets was his girlfriend. "Rachel? It's gonna be okay sugar-bear."

"No it's not." Her muffled cry sent a pang through Finn's heart. "My life is over."

"Baby come here." Finn sat on the edge of her bed, and pulled the blankets back. Rachel clambered into Finn's lap wiping her snotty nose onto his t-shirt. He held her close and rocked her as she continued sobbing. Rachel eventually fell asleep, lulled by Finn's heartbeat.

Kurt walked up to a miserable looking Rachel at her locker the next day.

"Hey Kurt." Rachel tried to sound enthusiastic when he saw her, but she couldn't shake the numb feeling she had obtained.

"Hey Rachel." The two of them shifted and averted gazes for a long, awkward minute. "I'm really sorry about yelling at you yesterday."

Rachel frantically shook her head. "No. You were right. I was pitying myself."

Kurt offered her a small smile, "You will make it to New York and you will be a star. I can feel it."

Rachel pulled Kurt into a tight hug.

"I love you Kurt."

"I love you too Rachel."

"Thank you for doing this with me Tina." Rachel said, giving off the first real smile since before the audition.

"Of course Rachel, you're one of my best friends. Oh look there she is go get her." Tina pushed Rachel forward with an encouraging nod.

"Madam Tibideaux!" Rachel called out to her. "I don't know if you remember me, my name is Rachel Berry—"

"I remember you." Madam Tibideaux interrupted. "You're the girl from Ohio, who keeps leaving me messages. 23 messages, in two weeks. What makes you think you are so special? Every time I have to listen to, and delete one of your messages, it takes time away from someone else, who's got dreams just like you do. What makes you more special, and deserving of my time than anyone else?"

Rachel had enough decency to look slightly ashamed, before a determined look entered her eyes. "I understand that 23 messages is a little extreme. I just need you to understand that what happened at my audition was a fluke. It's never happened to me before, and it will never happen again. If you would just come watch my show choir perform at Nationals you would see that."

Carmen Tibideaux studied Rachel over the rims of her glasses. There was no doubt this girl wasn't going to be a star in her eyes. But Carmen wasn't willing to give just anyone a second chance. "I'm sure you will perform wonderfully at Nationals, but watching you would be irrelevant. I have already chosen the 20 accepted students for this year. You were not one of them."

The news she didn't get accepted did not shock Rachel, she knew that she had blown her chances at the audition. Rachel glanced behind her to see that Tina had left the room to give Rachel some privacy. "I know the world of acting is dog eat dog. Believe me when I say I would literally do _anything_ to become a star."

"Even sacrifice friendship, and love?" Carmen asked intrigued.

"I would sacrifice both if it meant I had a better shot at making it." Rachel said with a determined nod.

"You auditioned with a Mr. Kurt Hummel, are the two of you friends?"

Rachel nodded, confused about where this question was leading. "Of course, Kurt is my best friend. We were planning on moving to New York together."

"And he, like you, dreams of being a Broadway star?" Carmen continued with her interrogation.

Rachel nodded her head enthusiastically as an answer, wondering what Carmen was getting at. When Rachel remained silent Madam Tibideaux continued.

"If you got into NYADA, you would be replacing one of the students on my list of 20. Would you crush your best friend's hopes and dreams to get into NYADA?"

Rachel considered Madam Tibideaux for a long moment before she opened her mouth to reply.

Kurt's tears started to fall when they were halfway home from the school. His vision started going fuzzy, and a lump formed high in his throat. It was a good thing he let Finn drive them home. He pulled his feet onto the seat so he could hug his knees and let his head fall against the window. He just sat there, letting tears trail down his cheeks, he was in shock.

He didn't notice anything until Finn was shaking him, the Navigator sitting in their driveway. "Come on dude, let's go inside. I'll make you some warm milk and we can watch a movie."

Kurt unbuckled his seat belt and got out of the car stumbling a little bit. "I just want to be left alone for the night okay Finn?"

Finn looked skeptical, following Kurt into the house. He watched him trudge up the stairs, and heard the click of a door closing. Finn understood Kurt wanted to be left alone, and he fully intended on listening to that request. As soon as he had supplied his bro with some warm milk. Finn knew it would make Kurt feel at least a little better.

Finn fidgeted until the microwave timer beeped. He carefully tread up the stairs making sure not to spill any hot milk on the carpet. He knocked once on Kurt's door and waited for a response. When he didn't receive one he slowly opened the door anyways. Kurt's rule was "If I don't tell you you can come in, you can't" but Finn figured this was a situation that rule didn't apply too.

"Kurt? I brought you some warm milk." When Finn didn't get an answer he set the milk down on the nightstand and patted the lump of blankets. He backed out of the room, quietly closing the door, and heading back downstairs, dialed Blaine's number. "Dude you gotta come over. Kurt's just lying there…"

Kurt let out another blood curdling scream. High pitched and heart wrenching. Blaine couldn't do anything but hold him while he screamed and sobbed, his own tears falling down his cheeks.

"It's just not fair." Kurt sobbed.

"No it isn't." Blaine said calmly.

"I killed my audition." Kurt could hardly speak in between gasps. "I just don't understand."


End file.
